Richard Mark Gergel (born August 14, 1954) is an American lawyer who serves as a

United States district judge The United States district courts are the trial courts of the U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each federal judicial district. Each district covers one U.S. state or a portion of a state. There is at least one feder ...

of the

United States District Court for the District of South Carolina The United States District Court for the District of South Carolina (in case citations, D.S.C.) is the federal district court whose jurisdiction is the state of South Carolina. Court is held in the cities of Aiken, Anderson, Beaufort, Charle ...

Early life and education

Born in

Columbia, South Carolina Columbia is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of South Carolina. With a population of 136,632 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is List of municipalities in South Carolina, the second-mo ...

, Gergel earned a

Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...

degree from

Duke University Duke University is a Private university, private research university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity, North Carolina, Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1 ...

in 1975 and a

Juris Doctor A Juris Doctor, Doctor of Jurisprudence, or Doctor of Law (JD) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law. In the United States and the Philippines, it is the only qualifying law degree. Other j ...

from

Duke University School of Law The Duke University School of Law is the law school of Duke University, a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. One of Duke's 10 schools and colleges, the School of Law is a constituent academic unit that began in 1868 as the ...

in 1979.President Obama Nominates Judge J. Michelle Childs, Richard Mark Gergel to District Court Bench for the District of South Carolina
, ''

whitehouse.gov whitehouse.gov or wh.gov is the official website of the White House and is managed by the Office of Digital Strategy of the White House Office under the Executive Office of the President of the United States. It was launched in 1994 by the ...

'' (December 22, 2009). Gergel's cousin was well-known industrial chemist Max Gergel, President/CEO of the Columbia Organic Chemical Company, or COCC.

Professional career

From 1979 until 1980, Gergel served as a

law clerk A law clerk, judicial clerk, or judicial assistant is a person, often a lawyer, who provides direct counsel and assistance to a lawyer or judge by Legal research, researching issues and drafting legal opinions for cases before the court. Judicial ...

for a law firm in Columbia, South Carolina, and he was a partner with the firm from 1981 until 1982. Beginning in 1983 and continuing until his nomination to the district court, he was the president and partner with his own law firm (most recently known as Gergel, Nickles and Solomon) in Columbia. He has specialized in personal injury law.

Notable case

In 1994, Gergel was the attorney representing the South Carolina Education Association and public school teacher Maggi Smith Hall. The case went to the

Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (in case citations, 4th Cir.) is a federal court located in Richmond, Virginia, with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts: * District of Maryland * ...

Richmond, VA Richmond ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), U.S. commonwealth of Virginia. Incorporated in 1742, Richmond has been an independent city (United States), independent city since 1871. ...

, and was considered one of the most important

First Amendment First most commonly refers to: * First, the ordinal form of the number 1 First or 1st may also refer to: Acronyms * Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-Centimeters, an astronomical survey carried out by the Very Large Array * Far Infrared a ...

cases to come down from the 4th Circuit in over a decade. At the time, the 4th Circuit was also considered to be the most conservative court in the nation. (Laura Sullivan, ''

Baltimore Sun ''The Baltimore Sun'' is the largest general-circulation daily newspaper based in the U.S. state of Maryland and provides coverage of local, regional, national, and international news. Founded in 1837, the newspaper was owned by Tribune Publish ...

'', November 18, 2003) The case, ''Hall v. Marion School District 2,'' 31 F.3d 183 (4th Cir. 1994), upheld the lower court's decision that Mullins District 2 acted illegally in firing Hall for exercising free speech in criticizing her superintendent and school board for reckless spending.

Federal judicial service

On December 22, 2009, President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

nominated Gergel to serve on the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina to fill the seat vacated by Judge Henry Michael Herlong, Jr., who assumed senior status on June 1, 2009. In his questionnaire to the

United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, informally known as the Senate Judiciary Committee, is a Standing committee (United States Congress), standing committee of 22 U.S. senators whose role is to oversee the United States Departm ...

, Gergel wrote that South Carolina Democratic Congressmen John M. Spratt, Jr. and

Jim Clyburn James Enos Clyburn (born July 21, 1940) is an American politician serving as the U.S. representative for . First elected in 1992, Clyburn is in his 17th term, representing a congressional district that includes most of the majority-black precinc ...

both previously had recommended Gergel to Obama as a district court nominee, and that South Carolina Republican Sen.

Lindsey Graham Lindsey Olin Graham (; born July 9, 1955) is an American politician and attorney serving as the Seniority in the United States Senate, senior United States Senate, United States senator from South Carolina, a seat he has held since 2003. A membe ...

also supported the nomination. Gergel had a hearing before the

on April 16, 2010. He was confirmed by the

United States Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and ...

on August 5, 2010, and received commission on August 9, 2010.

Trial of Dylann Roof

Gergel was the presiding judge on the trial of

Dylann Roof Dylann Storm Roof (born April 3, 1994) is an American mass murderer, white supremacist and neo-Nazi who perpetrated the Charleston church shooting. During a Bible study on June 17, 2015, at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charle ...

, who was convicted of 33 federal charges relating to the 2015

Charleston church shooting An Anti-Black racism, anti-black mass shooting and hate crime occurred on June 17, 2015, in Charleston, South Carolina. Nine people were killed, and one was injured, during a Bible study (Christianity), Bible study at Emanuel African Methodist ...

. Roof was convicted on all charges and controversially represented himself during the sentencing phase despite Gergel warning Roof it was not in his best interests to do so. On January 11, 2017, Gergel sentenced Dylann Roof to death after the jury recommended the

death penalty Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence ordering that an offender be punished in s ...

the previous day.

Author

Gergel is the author of ''Unexampled Courage: The Blinding of Sgt. Isaac Woodard and the Awakening of President Harry S. Truman and Judge J. Waties Waring'' (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019) and, with Belinda Gergel, of ''In Pursuit of the Tree of Life: A History of the Early Jews of Columbia, South Carolina'' (1996).

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Gergel, Richard 1954 births Living people Duke University School of Law alumni Judges of the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina Lawyers from Columbia, South Carolina United States district court judges appointed by Barack Obama Jewish American government officials American lawyers